Blowing Up

It was about 7:00 pm Sunday when a text came through on my phone warning me about a possible thunderstorm passing through.  (Yup. I get The Weather Channel's foul weather warnings texted to me. I love it.)

Yea, sure, I thought. There was nothing but  bright blue sky all around, the end of a lovely day that was ending a lovely weekend. So I saddled up my tennis shoes, grabbed my cell phone and headed out the door.

I wanted to go out and photograph the 3 or 4 fruit trees my husband and I had seen the day before on a Shabbat walk, sans phone. We believe we found an apple tree, a chestnut tree, some berry trees, a walnut tree and another tree which we could not even take a guess at. As always, in such situations, I try to take a photograph and send it to my friend Charlie Davis, head of the Natural History Society of Maryland, a wonderful group of naturalists and friends who devote themselves to preserving and interpreting the natural history of our state, and educating the rest of us about it.

So off I went, out the door by 7:06 - in the streaming sunshine. Although, come to think of it, when I looked really hard, it did, almost imperceptibly, seem to be a bit darker than usual for that hour of the day. So, just in case, I decided to alter my route so that it would take me on a circuit that, while allowing me to walk for miles should I wish, would also never leave me further than 10 minutes away from home.

I was not outside for 5 minutes before the bulbous, bulging leading edge of an enormous dark sky appeared atop trees on the jutting ridge that formed the hill I liked to walk. "Really?" I muttered.

I then heard the rushing, rustling, vibrant sound that I always confuse: water or leaves, friend or foe. I checked the stream. It wasn't the water. I looked up at the towering trees. They weren't moving either. Yet.

It was, I realized, the trees behind them, down the other side of the rise. The wind was coming up the valley wall, pushing the sound even before it began to push the leaves. By this time, the dark clouds looked like a monster bent on consuming the sky before it.

A man and his dog came out to investigate. Yup, we determined, it looks like it is going start blowing up soon.

It was time to head back home. The fast-moving clouds had overtake me by then; they had devoured the sun and it felt like they were coming after me. The wind had caught up too, strong enough to send showers of leaves and small branches raining down to the ground. Which is where I was - and I still needed to get through the back woods to my house, beneath a bountiful but not always sturdy canopy of poplars.

A deer and I eyed each other, both knowing that we needed to find shelter soon. If it hadn't been so exciting, and if I hadn't been so close to home, I might have been frightened. It truly felt like the world was being engulfed by a darkening, drenching monster.

I got home 7:36. The rains started in earnest 7:48 or so.

It is still dark as I write; still raining, though not the thunderous, pounding rain of monsters. Just the gentle rain of a warm summer day.

I wonder if all thunderstorms feel like this and act like this and I just never paid attention.

All I know is, it was pretty awesome.